englishfootballers Page 2 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
We’re always here for a good piss-taking
Frank Lampard may not have any idea what he’s doing as a manager, or he may be saddled with just the biggest collection of mishmashed parts that don’t fit, but he is aware of history. It was eight years ago, almost to the day, that Lampard’s Chelsea showed up to Anfield to stifle a title-chasing Liv...
To the death, then
The only result between Manchester City and Liverpool this morning that would have made it a “title decider” (which is how it was built by every outlet broadcasting it) was a City win. A four-point gap at this point in the season, requiring City to fuck up two games in the run-in while Liverpool to ...
Lost in Liverpool’s pursuit of a quad is Man City’s potential treble
With Tiger Woods falling out of contention and Sunday at Augusta turning into a sleepy 3-year-old crashing off of sugar, wake yourself up by flipping on probably the biggest game of the English Premier League season. Man City sits atop the table but only barely. Liverpool, still chasing a potential ...
West London is not going to welcome The Ricketts Family
It’s pretty clear that the Ricketts family, who own the Cubs, look upon Fenway Sports Group as something of an idol. They took their GM from Boston and made him the president of the Cubs. You know him as Theo Epstein. They have remade Wrigley Field and the neighborhood around it in the same fashion ...
We all know Liverpool can’t win the Quadruple, but what my book presupposes…
To say winning the Quadruple–the League Cup, the FA Cup, the Champions League, and the Premier League–is a dream isn’t accurate. No fan ever really thinks of it before a season starts, or really before even February. It’s beyond fantasy. It’s not something you’d ever give the time of day. Perhaps En...
Everton can’t really get themselves relegated, can they?
In the previous decade, we could have asked this question about Aston Villa, West Ham, or Newcastle. All of those clubs are of the same size as Everton, all should be comfortably in the second tier of the Premier League behind the big six, if not breaking into the big six themselves. And yet, the la...
Jesse Marsch tries again, this time at Leeds United
You can’t accuse Jesse Marsch of being unambitious. He replaced Julian Nagelsmann at RB Leipzig, and Nagelsmann had only left for Bayern Munich — one of the biggest jobs in the world — and is considered maybe the leading young genius on the European continent (whether this letterman’s jacket is evid...
Everton completely change gears, hires Frank Lampard
When you become a club that’s as much of an underground circus that Everton Football Club have become, your list of possible managers shrinks. You can really only get the desperate or those with nothing better to do, or possibly those who would work nowhere else. Everton have let Duncan Ferguson, wh...
So after Mason Greenwood, what will Manchester United do about Cristiano Ronaldo?
Not that we don’t know the answer, but it will make for even more awkward viewing than United’s on-field performances have been anyway....
There would be a beautiful symmetry to Newcastle getting relegated
It’s unusually harsh on Newcastle supporters, who are one of the more tortured fanbases in any sport you can find. Imagine if Pirates owner Bob Nutting owned a soccer club, that’s what Newcastle fans just went through. Mike Ashley was not only a raging asshole, but incredibly cheap when it came to t...
Aston Villa shows ambition by signing Philippe Coutinho, but for what exactly?
It may not be possible to feel sorry for someone who got to rake in tens of millions of dollars to live in Barcelona (with a brief sojourn to Munich) and not have to do much. And certainly Liverpool supporters won’t have any sympathy for Philippe Coutinho given the way he exited Anfield for the Nou ...
Rafa Benitez has become what he beheld
Deep down, Liverpool supporters would tell you they didn’t want to do this to Rafa Benitez when he was announced as Everton’s manager before the season. Or, to put it more accurately, they didn’t want to have to do this. Benitez is still, and will always, be loved by the red half of Liverpool for br...
Steven Gerrard takes the next step in his journey home
There isn’t anyone involved in Steven Gerrard taking over as manager for Aston Villa that doesn’t know the deal here. The ending that Gerrard wants is that this is the route to land him as manager of Liverpool one day, the club that he — mostly single-handedly — kept relevant for his playing career ...
Steve Bruce is still thinking about cabbage
Steve Bruce was managing at Aston Villa in the Championship, one level below the English Premier League, when a cabbage was thrown at him from the stands before a 3-3 draw against last-place Preston North End....
Liverpool and Manchester City hurl everything at each other in game of the season
It’s rare that games between the top-table inhabitants of soccer can live up to the billing. They usually cancel each other out, the fear of losing greatly outweighing the benefit of winning, and you might get the odd goal here or there in contests that are high on tension and intrigue but low on an...
Someone should get Harvey Barnes a GPS, or a sense of purpose
It’s been a pretty woeful start for Leicester City in the Premier League this season after being the surprise package the past two. While both ended in final-day heartbreak, as they missed out on the Champions League at the final hurdle, they were still fun to watch as they sparred with and bloodied...
David Moyes must be having a midlife crisis with West Ham
Maybe it was pandemic football that blinded me. After all, it was hard to fully invest in in the same way with the canned noise and lessened verve that each game had. Everything started to look and feel the same, and hence I couldn’t see what was really going on. ...
‘It’s Coming Home’... to Rome
With an English twit flying into space this weekend, there was a fleeting memory of a long-ago commercial for British Airways in which Britain had luxury accommodations even on a space station, while an American and a Russian endured cramped quarters and terrible astronaut food in the main cabin of ...
England is so money, and they don't even realize it
It could have been Sam Allardyce....
It’s never enough for England
You would think after winning the group, having the second-tightest defense in Euro 2020 so far (1.4 x GA), and being safely into the Round of 16 would be enough for England fans. But of course, this is England, and if they’re not complaining or being miserable, much like sharks not swimming, they d...